The invention relates to enforcement of parking regulations and more particularly to a system and method for recording parking violations for vehicles illegally parked in restricted parking areas, in order to generate parking violation citations. In a specific embodiment, the system and method is directed to recording parking violations for vehicles parked in the no parking zone of a bus stop.
Municipal governments enact regulations to govern the parking of cars and other vehicles along city streets. These regulations include no parking, no stopping and no standing zones to ensure access to certain areas along the side of the road for a variety of reasons. These zones are typically located in front of fire hydrants, handicap ramps and bus stops. Vehicles illegally parked in front of fire hydrants pose a safety hazard by causing delays in gaining access to the hydrant when it is needed. Blocked handicap ramps pose the obvious safety hazard for people with disabilities that have to traverse the curb or steps in place of the blocked ramp. In addition to causing delays on municipal bus routes, vehicles illegally parked in a bus zone also pose a safety hazard for passengers trying to load on and unload off the bus because the bus cannot stop at the appropriate location at the bus stop.
This especially impacts elderly people, or people with disabilities or injuries, that rely on public transportation. A municipal bus is typically capable of pulling up to a bus stop and “kneeling” at the curb to allow passengers easy access to the bus through the front door or the side handicap door. If an illegally parked vehicle prevents this from happening, the bus will have to stop some distance away from the curb or designated bus stop location and passengers will have to make their way to the bus. This may require people with disabilities, or other difficulties walking, to have to traverse the curb and enter the bus at a height. This process becomes even more hazardous when ice and snow are present.
Municipalities have recognized that vehicles blocking bus zones are becoming an increasing problem, especially in large cities, because of the resulting delays in the mass transit system and the safety concerns. In order to combat this problem, municipalities have increased enforcement efforts by hiring more transit and police officers to issue more citations and have increased fines for such offenses. Some municipalities have even elevated bus zone blocking to a moving rather than a parking violation. However, adding more transit and police officers requires the municipality to incur significant additional expense and has had only limited success in reducing the problem of bus zone blocking due to the large number of bus stops that need to be patrolled.
Therefore, there is a need for systems and methods to more efficiently enforce no parking zones, e.g., bus zones, and to significantly deter future illegal parking in such zones.